


Catch Me I'm Falling

by ronsparkyspeirs



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fix-It, Guilt, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Male-Female Friendship, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Older Man/Younger Woman, Pining, Reunions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-03-02 19:24:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18817414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ronsparkyspeirs/pseuds/ronsparkyspeirs
Summary: A different take spanning S4 all the way to S9 that focuses on Daryl and Beth.





	1. Cupid left an arrow in me, Got me feeling like I can hardly breathe, I’m suffocating (Nothing I can do, give me a reason)

**Author's Note:**

> listen ya'll, I stopped watching TWD literally the day Coda aired, I'm still mad about it and probably always be. They took character development and slapped tf out of it, so yeah, this is going to include before and after scenes. And since a lot of what I know of TWD now is from reading about it, the timeline may be screwed a bit. I also aged Beth up just a tiny bit because it fit better with the plot.

 

 

In the end, he’ll blame Michonne for it.

 

They’d been on a run and his hair kept getting in the way, stringy locks of brown obscuring his vision, making his forehead sweaty and sticky. Normally he wouldn’t have minded, liked his hair long and unkempt, made it harder for people to look into his eyes; but now, with regular showers and clean clothes every day, it’s a goddamned nuisance blowing his hair from his face everytime it gets in his eyes, especially when there’s no need for it.

 

He pushes his hair back for the hundredth time that day and scoffs when it falls right back down.

 

Michonne snorts a laugh and he returns a glare, “What?”

 

She shakes her head, “Why haven’t you cut it?”

 

“Don’t wanna.”

 

Michonne rolls her eyes, unsnaps a hair tie from her wrist, “Come here.”

 

“Why?” He asks, suspicious of the gleam in her eye.

 

“I’m going to tie it back, keep it off your face,” she explains, and he has a feeling she’s using the same tone she uses on the children back at the prison whenever she’s explaining something.

 

He glares a bit harder, but finally relents, Daryl walks towards Michonne, turns his back to her and squats down to his haunches. He tenses when she brings her hands up to his face, but she’s gentle, upward strokes with her fingers that have his hair up and away from his face. He feels a twist of her wrist and the snapping of the hair tie, then she’s patting his shoulder, “All done.”

 

Daryl palms the little bun she made at the crown of his head, feels the bundle of hair and wonders why he hadn’t done this before. His neck feels cooler and besides a couple of too short hairs that can’t be tied back, it’s off his range of vision.

 

“Thanks,” he rasps.

 

Michonne smiles wide, with all her teeth, “You’re welcome.”

 

* * *

 

 

When they arrive back at the prison he gets some odd looks, but he’s not sure if it’s the hair or the buck he’s carrying on his shoulders, bagged it by sheer luck, hadn’t even gone out with the intention of hunting.

 

Carol raises her eyebrows, a smirk on her face, “How—“

 

“Michonne,” he grunts, dropping the dead carcass on the table outside they use to dress the animals he brings back.

 

“Looks nice,” she tells him, and Daryl squints his eyes at her, can’t tell if she’s joking or not.

 

Carol ignores his stare and instead smiles, “Beth was wondering if y’all were back, said she really needs those crayons she asked for.”

 

“I got ‘em.”

 

“You should give them to her before she decides to go out there alone and get them herself.”

 

Daryl nods and makes his way back the o the pack he’d brought back with supplies. Two weeks earlier Beth had asked for some crayons, girl never asked for anything and the one time she did, she’d been insistent, said the children needed them, and _would you please look, Daryl?_ How could he say no to her.

 

He walks inside the prison, doesn’t see her anywhere out in the walkways or the communal area, so he goes to her cell, the privacy curtain pulled down. “Beth?” He asks, quietly, he hears the sound of the bed creaking as she stands, her soft footsteps, and then she’s pulling back the curtain, her eyes sleepy, hair halfway down.

 

“Whoa,” she says, her eyes widening and her mouth falling slightly open.

 

“What?” he asks, his neck growing hot with her scrutiny.

 

“Nothin,’ you’re just like, really handsome,” Beth responds and for a moment, Daryl is struck dumb, thinks he maybe misheard but when she keeps looking at him he grows annoyed, angry even.

 

“Don’t say shit like that,” he snaps, she’s making fun, and he never thought little Beth Greene could be so mean spirited.

 

“What?” she giggles, “Don’t believe me?”

 

Daryl can’t believe she’s being serious, least of all truthful, more than that, he can’t believe she just told him that without a trace of shame.

 

He scoffs, “ _Stop.”_

 

“It’s true, you have really pretty eyes,” Beth shrugs, like it’s no big deal that those words just came out of her mouth.

 

He can feel his face growing hot, his upper lip getting sweaty with embarrassment, he wishes he had his hair down, to hide his face, but all he can do is look down and stare at his boots.

 

“Did y’need something?” Beth asks, sparing him the humiliation of his awkward silence.

 

“Brought your crayons,” he tells her, squatting down to rifle through the backpack he took on the run. He pulls out a yellow box of crayons, sixty-four count, and Beth smiles so wide you’d think he was giving her a brand new car.

 

She hugs the box to her chest, her cheeks ruddy, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

 

“Ain’t nothin,’” he responds, but with her eyes lit up like the fourth of July, he reckons it’s gotta be _somethin.’_

 

* * *

 

 

Sometimes he watches Beth and that kid Zach, not anything creepy, just watches the way they act around each other, doesn’t really understand it, but a tiny, hidden, deep part of him wonders what it would be like, him and a woman, him and _Beth_ , but only because she’s so nice and safe and Carol is like a sister, Michonne is kinda scary sometimes, and Maggie has Glenn. Not to mention any of the Woodbury ladies, they’re all like a couple of hens clucking when they get together, he’s heard some of the things they say about him, about Rick, he never knew women could have such filthy mouths.

 

So that’s why he thinks of Beth. With her calm demeanor, her kind eyes, it’s easy to see himself with her because he can sort of see her with anybody.

 

She’s a sweet girl, never in a million years does he think his warped little fantasy would ever become reality.

 

But still, sometimes he thinks about the what-ifs.

 

* * *

 

 

A couple of days after the whole bun incident as he’s started to refer to it in his head, Daryl’s up on the tower, on watch, smoking and bored out of his goddamn mind.

 

He sees Carol heading his way, a bottled water in her hand, she climbs the ladder and stands next to him, “Figured you’d be thirsty,” she says, handing over the water.

 

“Thanks.”

 

He’s silent for a few minutes, the only sound coming from the wind and the trees, he’s trying to figure out how to say what he wants without sounding like an asshole. He had never thought much about his looks before, never even been self conscious about that, about the way he went to school with the occasional black eye? Sure, or about the way his clothes were always dirty and worn down, yeah, he might have been aware of that, but never his looks.

 

The women he was usually with never gave two fucks what he looked like, sure as hell never complimented him. But Beth was right, he’s seen the way some of the new women look at him, these women who have no idea who he is or what he’s like, they eye him up like a piece of pie and he never knows what to do about it. Wouldn’t even know where to start.

 

He clears his throat, feels heat crawling up his neck, “Beth said somethin’ the other day,” he starts.

 

Carol raises an eyebrow, “Yeah?”

 

He nods, going for casual but probably looking like an idiot, “Called me handsome.”

 

Her eyes widen, and a grin spreads on her face, “She did, did she?”

 

Daryl feels his face heating up like a furnace, this is why he doesn’t like to talk about shit like this with people, they get weird and then he gets uncomfortable and then things get real awkward, real fast. But this is Carol, he can talk to her about anything.

 

He nods, “Yeah, thought she was jokin’.”

 

“Why would she joke about something like that?”

 

“I’unno,” he shrugs.

 

“She’s right, y’know, you’re very handsome,” Carol tells him, and it fills him with something like pride, to hear her say that. He knows he’s a good hunter, and he knows he’s a good tracker, but ain’t nobody ever said nothing about his looks, he doesn’t think it makes him a vain asshole to be pleased about it, just something else he happens to be good at, and apparently without even trying.

 

“Well, you’re not more handsome than Rick, that’s for sure,” Carol teases, a smirk on her face.

 

He snorts a laugh, “Rick wishes.”

 

* * *

 

 

A week later he’s telling Beth that Zach died.

 

He wishes he could tell her how brave that kid was, how he was alright for a college boy. But he doesn’t really say anything except look at her and expect tears, the fact that she doesn’t cry surprises the hell out of him. But she’s brave too, steel in her spine despite looking like a delicate flower.

 

She hugs him and he tenses up, grabs her elbow because no one ever taught him how to give hugs.

 

Her eyes are so wide and blue when she looks at him, her hair gleaming in the light like some fucking disney princess. Her sweater slides off her shoulder and without even thinking about it, his fingers drift up, push the soft fabric up that milky white expanse of skin, Beth stays still as he does so, and after, Daryl clears his throat and tells her goodnight.

 

“Night,” she responds, and her voice sounds softer, kinder in a way that shouldn’t be possible after the news he just gave her.

 

* * *

 

 

Life goes on and sometimes he still thinks about him and Beth. He thinks about holding her hand, about tucking a flyaway piece of hair behind her hair, he thinks of how her blue eyes shine whenever he brings her something from a run. A new hair tie, or a bracelet, he thinks of kissing her sometimes, how tiny she would feel beneath him.

 

Sometimes he sees her carrying Judith and thinks what a great mom she’d make.

 

Some other jerks from Woodbury try getting on her good side, some even go as far as trying to win Hershel over, but nothing ever comes from it. Hershel gets ornery around the men, and Beth stays oblivious. She’s perfect and like a dream Daryl never knew was possible.

 

They celebrate her nineteenth birthday sometime in May. They’re not exactly sure of the day but Carol says she’s positive that it’s May.

 

Daryl tries hard not to think about the fact that the day she was born he was almost twenty-one.

 

Still, he gets her a gift. A tiny silver ring that he doesn’t think much of until she’s opening it in front of everyone, he hadn’t thought of the implications a _ring_ could have, just thought it was pretty, a little cross on the band, something to go along with her necklace and bracelet. But the way she takes it out of the poorly wrapped box, her smile sweet, and her cheeks pinkening with how everybody looks at her in anticipation.

 

“Oh, Daryl,” she breathes out, and he would have gotten down on one knee if that would have made it better for her.

 

He scratches at his neck, shrugs and shifts his body from side to side, like some grade school kid, “Don’t know if it’ll fit.”

 

“It doesn’t matter,” Beth says, shaking her head, “I’ll wear it around my neck if I have to.”

 

“Thank you,” she says, leans up and kisses his cheek. It’s quick and doesn’t mean anything, he’s seen her kiss Rick the same way a hundred times, but it makes him feel hot and twitchy, like he wants to run into the woods and never come back. Girls always made him nervous and Beth’s no exception, except she is, different from any other woman he’s ever known.

 

Hershel thanks him after, “Bethy isn’t like the rest of us, you might not think so but the little things matter to her a lot, keeps her happy,” he tells him, and Daryl doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know how he feels about the way Hershel looks at him. Serious and way too trusting of a dirty redneck with his youngest.

 

So he stays quiet, bites his lip and keeps his eyes on Beth as she unwraps the rest of her presents.

 

* * *

 

 

Three months later the governor is knocking on their door. Motherfucker ruining everything for them just because the pussy can’t get his shit together.

 

He murders Hershel in front of everyone and Daryl wishes he could gouge the governors other eye out. Pop it loose like a grape.

 

Instead he runs with Beth.

 

For days he stays silent. Angry and violent, on razor’s edge, and Beth being there just makes it worse. She doesn’t deserve his surliness, him being a dick, she’s a pretty girl who saw her dad get murdered in front of her and now she’s stuck with some nobody asshole. It makes him rage because it’s not fair.

 

So he stays silent, doesn’t even look at her if he doesn’t have to, thinks about all his stupid little fantasies he had before and wants to slap himself. Day dreaming of a perfect life is what got them into this mess, he should have been out there hunting the asshole that killed his brother, not at the prison playing pretend.

 

It’s not till she snaps him outta of it that he thinks that maybe this doesn’t have to mean dyin’ and despair. Sometimes he gets his head so far stuck up his own ass that he needs someone else to come along and pull it out for him.

 

So he follows her around, tells her peach schnapps is shit and then they find the moonshine.

 

 _God,_ he doesn’t even know how to begin to describe that night. Every possible emotion he could have experienced, he did, she brought things out of him that had been buried so deep he wasn’t aware they were even there.

 

The way she smiles after she tells him that he has to put it away, it makes him want to give her the world.

 

They set fire to the shack and run like children. Beth laughs and Daryl grabs her hand, holds tight so she doesn’t trip and fall. They run until the sun comes up, watching the dawn arrive with a peacefulness he’s never felt before.

 

He realizes that if he died that day, Beth would be the only person in the world to know his story, and he ain’t too mad about that.

 

* * *

 

 

He tells her that he’ll teach her to track, use the crossbow if she wants to.

 

“You’d do that?” She asks.

 

“Hmm-mm,” he hums back, can’t quite meet her eyes but knows she believes him.

 

“I just— it’s just that I’ve never seen you let _anybody_ borrow your crossbow.”

 

Daryl shrugs like it’s no big deal, but knows it is. The bow is like an extension of his arm, even before the turn, it was always with him, everywhere he followed Merle to, the bow went too. Teaching her the things he knows, well, it’s a little bit like she’s his too.

 

And whatever he can do to make sure she stays alive a little longer, just so’s she can stay with him, he’ll do it. Doesn’t care if it’s for selfish reasons, doesn’t even think about what Merle would say if he were there, it’s Beth and Daryl against the world now.

 

* * *

 

 

She looks like what he imagines Artemis might look like. Bow slung across her back, wisps of hair flying everywhere, sweaty skin pink and glowing. He, her faithful servant, he would worship at the altar of Beth Greene if only she would let him.

 

She’s beautiful in all kinds of ways and Daryl never thought that the end of the world could bring him so much happiness. He doesn’t want this to ever end.

 

Sometimes though, sometimes he wonders if she’s a figment of his imagination. Maybe he got out by himself, wandered the woods and became delirious with thirst and hunger, he wonders if she’s a nymph sent to bring him to his knees.

 

He watches as she glides through the forest floor in front of him, her pale limbs those of a dancer well versed in the steps. She’ll sing a song or hum beneath her breath and he’s entranced, he thinks of all the magical beings Beth Greene could be, of the power she possesses over him without even knowing, and he thinks, _I would die for her._

 

But then, in the middle of the woods, she’ll stop, look over her shoulder with a blinding smile and tease him, “C’mon, slowpoke, time’s a’ wastin’,” she’ll say, and he’ll grumble something back, pretend to be angry and she’ll just laugh

  
And it’s then that he _knows,_ he just knows.

 

 

 

 

 


	2. No one said it happened this fast, It's hard to make a good thing last forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beth and Daryl alone.

 

 

He likes teaching her. She’s smart and quick to pick things up, he likes the way she lights up whenever she gets something right, he likes it even more when she’s so confident she starts teasing him. 

He starts taking  _ liberties _ .

A hand on the small of her back to guide her as they track, a squeeze of her elbow when he wants to get her attention, holding her hand when the underbrush starts getting too thick to comfortably walk through.

He lets her start taking liberties too.

The first time she gets a good look at the scars on his back is two weeks after the moonshine shack. It’s blazing hot, still early morning and his clothes are plastered to him, he can feel the sweat on his eyebrows, constantly having to wipe it away to prevent the burning sensation sweat in your eyes brings. His hair sticks to his sweaty neck and face.

“Hey Greene,” he rasps.

“Yeah?”

“You got any more of those hair things?”

She pauses mid step, swings her backpack around and squats down on the forest floor, “Sure, let me check.”

He watches as she digs through their backpack, her arms disappearing halfway through the thick canvas material. She makes a face as she looks for the hair tie, lost somewhere in all their stuff, extra clothes, bandages, a can or two of food, it’s not a lot but it’s enough. Beth grins when she finds what she’s looking for, she lets out a triumphant whoop when she brings the hair tie out, a bright purple thing that she twirls in her pointer finger, cheeks pink with satisfaction. She’s so  _ cute _ , and he’s pretty sure she has no idea.

“Want me to do it for ya?”

He nods and plops right in front of her, letting his arms drop on his bent knees, he clasps his fingers together in anticipation.

Beth doesn’t hesitate and goes right for his scalp, her fingers work quickly through his hair and it feel so damn good to have her touching him like that, doesn’t make him hard, but it reminds him he’s still a person. She untangles his hair with care, smoothing it back so he can see without obstruction.

“My ma used to run her fingers through my hair, to put me to sleep,” he tells her, it’s easy to talk with his back to her.

Her hands slow down and he can feel her gaze on the side of his face, “I can’t imagine you as a child,” she responds, softly.

“I was a blond little thing, scrawny,” he shrugs, “Merle was always the bigger one.”

Beth gives his hair a slight tug, “You were blond? Like me?” She asks, incredulously.

Daryl grins, “Till I was about twelve, hair started turning darker after that, took after my ma that way.”

She giggles behind his back, small tufts of air hitting his neck, “Blond Daryl Dixon, how ‘bout that?”

He shrugs, and she finishes tying his hair up. Both of them get to their feet and he squeezes her arm, “Let’s see if we can find some water nearby, wash up.”

“Alright,” she smiles, with her face just as sweaty as his.

They keep walking for nearly half an hour, till Daryl hears the familiar trickle of water, a few meters ahead laying a wide stream of water, it seemed about knee deep, but the most incredible part was that there were no signs of walkers anywhere in sight.

Even still, Beth turns to look at him, apprehension in her eyes, “Can we?” She asks, motioning towards the water.

He nods and she grins like a crazy person, that same expression that blossomed in her face when they set fire to the moonshine shack. Beth drops their backpack to her feet, wasting no time in unbuttoning her jeans, kicking her boots off and then undressing without a care, she gets down to her underwear and Daryl figures it’s time to look away.

She was pale and pink and you would think that his thoughts would drift to more carnal things but the few times they had undressed in front of each other his thoughts never strayed. He appreciated her beauty, the way she was small but strong, the muscles in her legs, the little waist she had, but his dick never had much say in anything, she was Beth and he was Daryl, and that was that. He could hear her splashing in the water, she lets out a muffled shriek when she goes down under, coming back up only to giggle, “It’s colder than it looks,” she says, her teeth chattering in the breeze.

“Good, we need to cool down.”

“Come in, there’s nothing around here.”

“Nah, I’ll wait my turn.”

“Daryl, please, come on, we can pretend we’re on vacation.”

At that, he turns to look at her, only to see her running her fingers through her matted hair. She smiles at him and Daryl wishes this world could be different for her, instead of dipping in a stream in the woods with an old redneck, and pretending that they’re somewhere else. He wishes things could be pretty for her.

“Just for a little bit,” she says, softly, like she knows he’s going to say no.

The moment he puts down his crossbow she looks delighted, settling further into her spot in the water. He undresses methodically, leaves his boxers on and wades into the water next to her. It feels nice, after being stuck to his clothes for weeks, feels refreshing like a cold beer on a Sunday afternoon.

“Isn’t this nice?” Beth asks, mirroring his thoughts, he grunts in response and is startled when Beth cups her hands in front of her, dips them into the water and pours the liquid onto his head. He stares at her with wide eyes and she giggles, “You’ll get sick if you don’t get your hair wet.”

The water isn’t nearly deep enough for him to dive in but he bends over, submerging his upper body into the freshwater. When he comes back up he slicks his hair out of his face, “Good?” He asks, but she stays silent so he turns to her, realizes too late that him going under the water gave her a first hand look at the scars on his back. She’s still looking and he shifts uncomfortably.

“Your dad?” She asks, and he nods.

The silence grows from awkward to tense and then to something else, she scoots closer to him, lifts her hand and places it on his back. Daryl flinches under her touch but her hand stays steady, she traces the most prominent scars, some of them long and thick, others rounded and deep. He knows what they look like, purple and darker than the rest of his flesh, ugly things that his father gave him.

He freezes when he feels her mouth on his skin, her lips soft and barely there, she kisses the marks and he’s not sure why or how but he feels his cock getting hard. Beth scoots even closer, wraps her arms around his torso and lays her cheek on the tattoo on his back.

“How old were you when you got this done?” She asks.

Daryl swallows back the sudden dryness in his mouth, “I was twenty.”

He feels her smiling, “I would have liked to have met you then.”

 

“I was a dick.” He responds. 

She laughs, gives him a squeeze and unwraps her arms from around him, he wants to hold her close, wants to feel her soft skin on him but knows it wouldn’t be appropriate. “I bet you were a lot of fun, though, wild,” she says.

He snorts, “That’s one way to call it.” And he doesn’t mention that he was stealing, drinking every day, smoking pot and taking pills, making nothing out of himself, he doesn’t think she’d want to hear all that.

“You were probably the kind of boy that my daddy would have warned me against,” Beth says, and he thinks she would be sad to mention her dad, but there’s a glint in her eyes, mischievous and teasing, his cock is still hard and her grin is made of sin.

He shrugs, biting at his inner lip. A lot of good girls tried to make him their bad boy boyfriend back in the day, they thought they could handle him, tame him into being civilized, those kinds of girls usually went ignored, he didn’t  _ want  _ to be anyone’s anything. Merle always told him he was wasting good opportunities.

“Did you ride a motorcycle back then, too?”

He nods and she bumps his arm with her elbow, “Yeah, my daddy would have definitely told me to stay away from you.”

Daryl looks her in the eyes, “Would you have?” 

“No.”

  
  


* * *

 

 

He thinks he could fall in love with this girl. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

She holds his hand sometimes. No rhyme or reason to it, just likes to grab hold and act like it’s the most natural thing in the world. 

Sometimes it’s out of necessity. Like when it’s early morning and the mist is real thick and deep, they can’t afford to speak or run the risk of losing each other in the fog so they hold hands. Other times the underbrush is thick and the roots from the trees sprout like speed bumps every so often, Beth grabs his hand and doesn’t let go for fear of tripping. But most times, most times, Beth just slides her hand in between his and her bones feel thin like a birds but she grips his palm with such force that he knows it would take an act from God to separate them.

It’s one of these days, when she’s swinging their arms back and forth, humming under her breath that they come across people. They quite literally stumble across their camp, and Daryl blames the way her hand felt in his for the distraction.

It’s a man and a woman, and they both look as startled as Daryl and Beth. She lets go of his hand and Daryl freezes, unsure of what to do next, since the other couple don’t seem to be going for their weapons. He really doesn’t want to be the asshole that points a crossbow at these people for no reason but he’ll be damned if he lets anything happen to Beth.

“H-hello,” the woman says, a grimace that’s trying hard to be a smile on her face, and with a nervous tinge in her voice. Daryl guesses that they’re both in their early thirties, and at least they don’t look completely deranged at first glance.

“Hi,” Beth responds, and Daryl almost rolls his eyes, leave it to this girl to go around making friends with strangers in the woods.

“I’m Beth, this is Daryl.”

“My name’s Shannon, this is James.”

The man looks at them warily and Daryl would be unnerved if he didn’t.

“Y’all got a camp?” The woman asks.

“No,” he responds, his voice a little hostile by the way Beth shoots him a look.

“Do y’all?”

The woman shakes her head, “We’re on our own.”

“So are we,” Beth responds.

And Daryl tenses beside her, what if these people are lying? What if Beth just got them killed? They don’t look very well fed, and they don’t look any cleaner than him and Beth do, but looks can be deceiving. He’s probably making a face because the next thing he knows, Beth is grabbing hold of his wrist, a questioning look in her eyes.

He gives her a brief shake of his head, and he realizes that the couple is staring straight at them. He knows that him and Beth have developed a silent way of speaking, they can say a million different things with just their eyes and he thinks how odd that must look to two strangers.

Finally Beth smiles at the people, “Y’all mind if we rest a bit?”

The other woman smiles back, she looks relieved and says, “Not at all! Come on, we can share food.”

And Daryl almost laughs because it sounds like she’s inviting them into their home, as opposed to some little half-assed camp that they haven’t even secured with a noise system.

Beth goes over and sits in front of the woman on a fallen tree log, the other man has yet to say a word and that’s fine by Daryl. They size each other up though, the man isn’t as thick around the arms as Daryl but he looks tall, even sitting down, and his wiry muscles look like they were earned out in the wild and not in a gym. He’s blond and his eyes are the same shade of green as Maggie’s, finally, he nods towards Daryl.

“We have water, help yourself,” he tells Daryl.

“Nah, I’m alright.”

He follows Beth’s example and sits in front of the two people, he zones out as the women start speaking, preferring to listen to the sounds of the forest instead, the man sits quietly too, cleaning his knives. Daryl notices that while they may not have made a good camp, they’re very well armed. He sees two knives on the woman, a gun on her hip and a small wooden paddle in her backpack. The man has a rifle strung over his back, a knife on each leg, and two more on each hip. It’s more than he and Beth have but he doesn’t think these two can be as quiet as them, they don’t look like they can survive much longer out in the woods before venturing out to nearby civilization.

“How long y’all been together?” Shannon asks. 

“Almost two years,” Beth responds.

The woman looks at Beth, then at Daryl, “That’s a long time.”

She smiles, and he almost knows where this is going, “You’re very young,” she says, not accusing but almost.

Beth shrugs, “I’ll be twenty pretty soon.”

“Y’all been alone this whole time?” The man asks.

“No, we were with a group. Had a place, my daddy and sister were there too, but some bad people came and we had to run,” Beth says, “we got separated from everyone.”

Shannon looks like she wants to say something else, probably about how convenient it is that Daryl was left alone with the prettiest girl, or how she’s very pretty and he’s very not, and somehow Beth seems to know where this is headed too, because she scoots a little closer to him on the log they’re sitting on, her arm touches his and Daryl turns to look at her.

“I’m lucky I got out with Daryl, you see, he’s my husband,” she says, with a bright smile on her face as she slides her hand through his.

Only thing Daryl can do is hold on and wonder why the fuck she’s come up with this lie, he ain’t going to say nothing stupid and ruin it for her though, must be a reason for it but it still makes him break out in a nervous sweat.

He looks at their joined hands while she keeps talking, “My daddy was a preacher, he married us while we were still together.”

Shannon’s eyes are wide, her cheeks a little flushed, “Oh wow, that’s— Congratulations!” She says, flustered but sounding like she means it.

“What about you guys? Were you together before all this?” Beth asks, slyly diverting the conversation from them onto the two strangers.

And they keep talking, deciding to sleep in the same camp, keep watch two at a time so each woman can get a bit more sleep. Beth kisses his cheek before she goes to lay down and Daryl knows that everyone would be able to see his red cheeks if it was light out, but even so he manages to kiss the back of her hand, holds her palm against his face, lets go and gives her a tiny smile.

The next morning they wake at dawn, the women already up. They say their goodbyes and wish each other luck, Beth looks a little sad but she knows they can’t travel together. After they’ve been walking for almost an hour Daryl clears his throat.

“Why you say that last night? About me being your husband?”

“Oh!” Beth giggles, “I hope you don’t mind, I kinda just sprung that on you.”

“Why?”

A little furrow appears between her eyebrows, she looks like she’s thinking hard before she says, “I didn’t like what Shannon was insinuating, about you being older, she said it like you were taking advantage or something.” 

“I know you’re not like that, and I know it doesn’t really matter what people think, because I know better, but—“ she shrugs, “it just bothered me.”

“You didn’t want them thinking I was some kind of creep,” he tells her.

“Yeah,” she grins, nodding her head, “It’s what I’m going to say to every stranger we meet from now on, so you better get used to it.”

He snorts, amused but also a little embarrassed, and a little something else he can’t name. Him, Daryl Dixon, being her husband, her  _ man, _ he didn’t care if it was only pretend and that she might not mean anything by it besides a way to make him out decent. None of that matters because when she called him her husband, he felt like if he tried hard enough he could be, felt like he could do anything if she was his wife.

  
  
  


* * *

 

 

The weather starts changing and Daryl starts thinking of someplace to hole up for the winter. But then she gets her ankle hurt by that trap, which he should have been paying closer attention to, instead, he’d been following her with his gaze, her serious expression and that blonde hair he wanted to run his fingers through. 

They find that funeral home and he  _ knows  _ it’s too good to be true. Nothing comes easy or without a price, and who would have thought that a few days under a roof and enough food to put in their bellies meant giving up Beth for payment.

Because that’s what it feels like when he sees the car peeling out of the driveway, feels like he just gave her up, like he didn’t even try. So he runs. Runs and runs all night, keeps running through the stitch of pain on his side, even after his lungs beg for mercy, it’s his own penance for letting her go.

Then those assholes come around. It’s like fate or whatever set them on his path, like a test from some divine being,  _ So, you think you’re a good man, asshole? Well, let’s see how you fare with these sons of bitches,  _ that’s what he’d heard in his mind, at least.

But he’s had years of practice. Growing up with degenerates and later, hanging around junkies and low-lifes with Merle. He knew how to play this game, knew how to win, but then this bastard brought Beth up, unknowingly, yeah, but he couldn’t even imagine what they would have done to her if Beth had been with him. Len doesn’t even have to say her name and Daryl is riling up for a fight, all for some girl he’d let get taken. He’d always been the sweeter one of the Dixon boys, that’s for sure.  

Then they find Rick. Daryl knows there’s no way he could have killed all those guys by himself but now, on his knees, beaten and about to watch his family get hurt, he kinda wishes he would have tried.

For a split second he’s grateful that Beth isn’t there. One look at her pretty face and these men would have claimed her as theirs. Bile rises in his throat, hopeful that wherever she is, pieces of shit like these can’t get their hands on her. Rick ends up surprising him, like he always does, bites Joe’s throat out like a beast. Stabs the other man till there’s nothing but ground meat, and Daryl can’t say he blames him. He would have done the same to the people that took Beth, if only he’d been faster.

 

* * *

 

 

Terminus. What a fucking shit show that turned out to be. People, real, breathing, alive people, eating folks just for the hell of it. He’s glad Rick and the others killed all of them, doesn’t give a shit that they did it in a church either, you’d have to be born yesterday if you could think that those terminus people would have let them go, what about others that came by? The world is better off without scum like that in it. 

Anyways, he’d been mighty occupied by that time. Searching for that damn car, for any clues about the fuckers that had taken Beth. And then it’s like fate all over again, meeting that Noah kid and having him say her name. Felt like a miracle, he could actually feel this sense of relief and happiness settling over him like a warm blanket, to know where she was being held, that she was  _ alive. _

Not that he had doubted her for a second, but actually hearing it?

They reunite with their group again, Noah in tow, he lets Rick know in no uncertain terms that if he has to go in that hospital to get Beth out by himself, he will.

Turns out, he doesn’t have to. They make a plan, that in hindsight, if Daryl hadn’t been so consumed with his need to find Beth, he would have second guessed. There was too many cops, too many things that could go wrong, the other people in the hospital, not to mention the fact that the hospital was located in the middle of downtown Atlanta.

They infiltrate the hospital with the help of a couple of hostages, easy peasy when he thought of Beth, didn’t much think twice of taking these people, didn’t care for one. The inside of the hospital smells like bleach and despair, they pass by people that have the same look his mom did before she died, cold, dead eyes and expressionless faces. Ghosts just drifting through the bright hallways, he wonders if Beth will look the same, or if these assholes have beat the hope out of her, he almost laughs because he doesn’t think there’s a damned thing in this world that could make her stop singing.

And then she’s right there. Glowing like a fucking star or something, blonde hair almost white, she’s  _ clean,  _ and her eyes are so blue, so full of life. She’s beautiful and he wishes he could say something, anything at all, that would hint at how happy he is to see her.

It doesn’t matter if her sister has gone, doesn’t matter that she has those scars on her face, or that maybe he did see a little brokenness in her gaze when she looked toward their group, it doesn’t matter because he’s there now, and she’s coming with them.

Years later he’ll think of how stupid she was. He’ll get angry and chop at a tree so hard that it almost topples over, later he’ll cry and cry, and big, nasty, sobs will get caught in his throat till Carol has to come around and make sure he’s still breathing right.

But now, now he just wishes he could have pulled her back. Knocked her over the head and carried her out if that’s what needed to be done. Instead, she gets shot in her pretty head, blood blooms like a flower from her skull, and her body falls like a marionette having its strings cut, all within the longest second of his life.

Naturally he doesn’t think about what he does next, just pulls his gun from his waistband and shoots the bitch dead.

Later still, he’ll blame Michonne and the chain of events she set forth back on that run so very long ago. For making him believe that a man like him could have any right to dream of better things.

 

 

 

 

 


	3. Oh but I go (Hold onto me baby)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get worse before they get better.

  
  


 

Daryl doesn’t remember the next few weeks all that well, he doesn’t  _ want  _ to. He knows he lost his mind sometime between Charlotte and Greensboro. He knows this because forty-two days after arriving in D.C Carol let him know. 

“You were a goner, for a couple of weeks after Atlanta,” she says, “You let yourself feel it.”

“Feel what?” He asks.

“Everything.”

And Daryl’s not sure that’s what that was. He never grieved nobody’s death before, not even his own brother. Sure he had cried, but there had been no time for proper mourning after, not when they’d been busy trying to find the governor and then trying to keep a community of people afloat.

But after Beth, he’d been so consumed with sadness, everywhere he turned he could see her, any time someone sang a lullaby for Judith the only thing he wanted to do was clamp his ears shut and never have to listen to a song again.

He’d been so close to getting her back. That’s what hurts the most, the fact that he could already feel her hand in his. He had already been imagining the things she’d say to him, the easy way they’d be able to just  _ be  _ like before.

“You loved her, didn’t you?”

Daryl startles, he doesn’t know  **what** he felt for her, didn’t have enough time to figure it out, doesn’t think love is a big enough word for it. He knows a lot of things about her, what he felt like when she was near, but love? Love doesn’t tear you up from the inside out and leave you begging for anything to make it stop.

“You were like Rick, after Lori died,” Carol tells him.

And he doesn’t know what to say to that.

 

 

* * *

 

 

“When we were together I felt breathless. Now you are.” 

“Darling, dearest, dead.”

“My love for you shall live forever. You however did not.” Enid giggles and Daryl makes a face.

“That’s some pretty dark shit,” he says.

Carl laughs, “It’s from a series of books,” he tells him, picking up one of the hardcovers and showing the front to Daryl, “it’s meant to be for children.”

Daryl scoffs, “Some children’s stories.”

Enid shrugs, “I like the dedications, they’re sweet.”

There’s a long silence, while Daryl thinks of what would make a person write these kinds of things for kids, then Carl clears his throat and Daryl looks up from the book.

“Beth liked them too,” Carl says, softly, like he thinks the words might hurt Daryl.

“Who’s Beth?” Enid asks.

Daryl picks up one of the books, flips the pages open, and reads the fine print letters,  _ When we first met, you were pretty, and I was lonely. Now I am pretty lonely.  _ He remembers seeing Beth around the prison, reading books whenever she had time, now he wishes he would have asked about them.

“She and Daryl…” Carl trails off, unsure of what to say, and Daryl stays quiet because there’s no words for them.  _ She and Daryl,  _ yeah, for a while it had just been  _ she  _ and  _ him. _

“Oh.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Things go bad like they always do. Glenn, Abraham, they get murdered, right in front of everyone. The impotence that Daryl feels when he sees it happening, it’s like being seven again and watching his pa beat the shit out of his mom. How could he have thought that he was going to save anyone if he had never been able to save himself? 

Not for the first time is he partly glad that Beth’s not there. Negan would have probably taken her, and she would have had to see the man that killed her family day in and out. But Daryl’s only human and selfish, so the other part of him wishes she was with him, maybe she could have saved them all, one look at her pretty face and Negan would have rethought his strategy, Beth was smart that way. She had always been able to placate the worst of tempers, she could have you feeling like a bad puppy dog with her big blue eyes.

He remembers one time at the prison when Merle was there, being his usual self and antagonizing everyone. For some reason everybody had the bright idea to leave Beth alone with Merle, they were sat in the kitchen area, Beth with Judith in her lap, Merle tickling the baby’s feet.

Daryl had walked upon the scene ready to drag Merle out by the ear but he’d been surprised when he heard Beth giggling at something the older man said. So Daryl being Daryl, decided to keep hidden, listen in and wonder what she said to make Merle be nice.

“You’re nothing like Daryl, are you?” She asked.

“Don’t reckon so, since I would never do anyone’s bidding like he seems to be doing for the sheriff,” he responds, anger in his voice.

“Isn’t that what you were doing for the governor?” Beth says, her voice curious and soft.

He thinks Merle might get up and start yelling, calling Beth names, but he doesn’t, his shoulders just seem to hunch in on themselves, he mumbles a curse beneath his breath and says, “I never wanted my baby brother to be like me.”

“You should tell him that. Daryl thinks the world of you, he really loves you.”

And Daryl feels his face heating up, he’s never talked about Merle with anybody here but she just seems to know everything about him.

“He tell you that?”

Beth smiles, “No, but he doesn’t have to. He left with you didn’t he? Didn’t even come to say goodbye.”

“You could be part of the group too, if you wanted. Family should never be separated,” Beth says, she gets up with Judith in her arms and with one last smile, she leaves.

Daryl never said anything about that day and neither did she. Beth probably knew how personal that conversation had been, and even after death, she had kept Merle’s confidence.

He thinks about all of this in the end, after the blood has dried on the ground and after everyone is walking around with dead eyes and empty words. Maybe if she had been there, no one would have died, maybe if she had been there, it wouldn’t have hurt as much.

  
  


* * *

 

 

He gets taken by Negan and his people. They beat him and try to humiliate him by keeping him naked and feeding him dog food. Shows what they fucking know. He wasn’t lying to Beth when he said he was used to all this,  _ things being ugly _ . Back when he was too young to hunt and his pa was out on a bender and his mom was passed out on the couch, and little Daryl Dixon hadn’t eaten for two days, he would have given his left hand for a kibbles n’ bits sandwich. As for the clothes, hell, he lived out in the woods before the outbreak, some days he lived in his boxer shorts and nothing else, considering he could go weeks without seeing another person. 

So no, shit like that didn’t aggravate him.

What bothers him is that fucking music.

The loud grating noise that never lets him sleep, not even for a second.

But even then, they don’t know Daryl enough to make him suffer, not the way they want to. If they really wanted to break him they’d play some Tom Waits, or hell, even some Fleetwood Mac, both artists had been a constant repertoire in Beth’s music catalog. So it’s easy to go back into his own head, inhabit that space that he hasn’t visited in years, the space that kept him safe from his pa during beatings. It was easy to go there since he’d learned early on that crying just made his dad beat him harder.

And now, with so many years of practice, he slips inside that quiet place that allowed him to survive. But it seems like these days **she’s** there too. Her laughter, her voice, her face, those memories of the last time he was happy, they keep him going, even after Negan takes him to taunt Rick. He almost feels sorry for these assholes trying so hard to make him less, not for the first time he’s kinda glad for the upbringing he had and for the life he led after.

He can tell who’s hard and who’s faking it. Learned it back when he was seventeen and Merle took him to his first biker bar. Some dick had been running his mouth, a man with a brand new Harley, he insulted one of the bikers old lady and when he saw the other man stand up, fists clenched, quickly he had backpedalled, raising his hands in deference, sweat dripping off his brow.

Needless to say, that man earned a very hard lesson that day. It’s the aftermath that Daryl remembers the most though, how not one single person had got up to help him, no one had cared that he was passed out and bleeding on the dirty floor. Everyone had just kept drinking, stepping over the prone body if they had to.

Merle had cackled and gave him a beer. And Daryl drank, comfortable in that dangerous world in a way very few people seemed to be.

Not being scared, not flinching when a gun gets pressed to your temple, that’s not being a  _ badass _ , it’s your reward for living a shitty life.

 

 

—————-

 

 

Things aren’t always bad. After the Saviors and Negan, and everything else, things are kinda alright. He really starts believing in good people, that there can be something worth it at the end of the day. 

He sees kids being born, babes that will only know the harsh realities of the way of the world now, but that will be stronger and better equipped to handle anything this new world throws at them than anyone else. He sees kids turning into teenagers, ragin’ hormones and all that. Sometimes he sees them die too, but he doesn’t like to think about that. He visits communities that are flourishing and it’s almost like before, except now he’s not just some redneck asshole with an ever bigger asshole of a brother to follow around. He has a job like everyone else, and people  **respect** him, who would have thought that ever possible.

But always, always in the back of his head, he thinks about Beth. How could he stop when everything good in the world reminds him of her.

 

He tries for distraction. Becomes Rick’s second in command, follows orders and provides strategies when asked for them. But then Rick is gone and it’s just him and Michonne and their kids and she doesn’t need him around

“Where will you go?” She asks, as he packs what little he owns into a duffel bag.

Daryl sighs, “Maggie said she could use the help.”

“We could use the help around here,” Michonne tells him, a wry smile on her face.

“Nah,” he responds, shaking his head, “you got your kids to keep you going. Don’t need me around.”

He finishes packing and turns back to Michonne, her face serious, and Daryl would be fidgeting from one foot to another if he didn’t know what her expressions meant by now. “At least say goodbye to the children.”

He nods, hangs his duffel over one shoulder and stays still as Michonne embraces him with one arm, his hand gives her elbow a firm squeeze and she lets go. The two walk to the living room where RJ and Judith sit playing with a couple of toy cars.

Judith looks up first, and not for the first time is Daryl amazed at how much she looks like Lori.

“‘M headed out,” he says.

“For good?” Judith asks.

“For a while.”

She nods, and sometimes it felt like she was nine going on forty, girl was mature for her age.

Daryl squats down to eye level, he flicks her dark braid with two fingers, smiles a little while he remembers another girl that used to wear braids in her hair.

“Will you tell me about Beth one day?” She asks, and Daryl almost chokes on his own spit, he wasn’t aware Judith even knew about Beth, he doesn’t remember anyone talking about her in front of the young girl.

“Mom told me about her. Said she was the first one to take care of me after my mom died, my  _ other  _ mom, I mean,” Judith shrugs.

Daryl swallows back a tickling in his throat, “She sang to you.”

“I wish—“ Judith trails off, then she lays a little hand on top of Daryl’s shoulder, “you’ll come visit won’t you?”

He nods and gives her hand a squeeze, he reaches over and runs his hand over RJ’s head, the little boy too preoccupied with his toys to give Daryl much attention.

  
  


* * *

 

 

He apologizes to Maggie for Glenn. Cries in her arms and thinks what an amazing woman she is for not blaming him. 

Daryl watches as her belly grows bigger, she’s beautiful and he wishes Glenn was around to see it, he wishes Hershel was too,  _ he wishes for a lot of things. _

He watches too as she grows stronger with the birth of her son. Watches as she makes decisions that not anybody else would have been able to make. Not only does she make sure that the Hilltop survives, she makes sure it  _ thrives.  _ They grow closer during that time, he understands why she makes the choices she does and in return he’s able to be around the last living connection to Beth. Makes him feel like an asshole, like he’s using Maggie and baby Hershel, the last tethers to a girl he would have loved. Maggie doesn’t look like Beth, and Hershel looks more like his father but sometimes, sometimes, he sees a glint in Maggie’s eyes, a wild thing that used to make its home in Beth’s expression. And then other times, little Hershel will look at him with wide eyes, an openness in his face, and then suddenly he’s home.

Back in those woods with a girl that might have been a woman, had she had the chance. He tries hard to hold back the tears during those times, but a hard lump in his throat always makes it impossible to swallow.

“When are you going to tell me about your time with Beth?” Maggie asks him one day, as she looks over plans for a new garden in her office.

Daryl bites at his lower lip, this is not the first time she’s asked this of him.

Maggie smiles, her green eyes glittering like two emeralds. Enough time has passed that she no longer grows sad at the thought of her younger sister. “No matter what happened out there, I won’t be mad, Daryl.”

It takes him a second to catch on to what she’s implying. That he and Beth would even, it was never like that—

“It wasn’t like that,” he grunts, “your sister, she—“ and he shrugs, not sure what Maggie wants to know.

“You guys were out there for a while, and after Atlanta,” Maggie stops looking at her schematics and looks to him instead, “Nobody thought we were gonna get you back. I had Glenn still, but you, it seemed like…” she lets out a nervous sounding scoff, shakes her head.

“It seemed like your entire world had been ripped away from you.”

“It was,” he rasps, and Daryl’s not sure he wanted to say that out loud. Sounds like a confession he didn’t even get to make to the girl who inhabits his every thoughts from time to time.

Maggie’s expression turns serious, he drops his gaze, afraid of what she’ll see.

“Was she happy?”

_ Oh Christ, _ how could she ask him that. He doesn’t want to fucking think about this, not right now when he knows The other woman will be able learn things he was barely on the verge of discovering. She’s always been observant in that way. But Maggie wants to know, and she deserves that much after years of him skirting around the topic. So he thinks, digs deep inside his mind and remembers every single time Beth smiled at him, how she giggled when he was teaching her how to track, the time they found a clearing out in the woods, a fairy circle Beth had called it and Daryl had responded how ‘you’re finally home then,’ and Beth had grinned. She had made them sit down for a couple of minutes, just enjoying the sounds and the bright green grass around them, the flowers, but he had only eyes for her, she had been the prettiest thing that day. Pretty like a Sunday morning, bright and new and everything he never had.

“Yeah, she was.”

Maggie smiles hard, like the first time she introduced baby Hershel to the group, proud and relieved.

“That’s good,” she says, “that’s how I wanna remember her, y’know?”

And he nods, because he’d heard the stories Noah told Rick. Beatings and rapes, people trapped like animals, he wishes he could go back and kill every single cop in the place. But that’s not where she is anymore, his girl is somewhere else back in Georgia.

Daryl thinks that yeah, she was happy, he made her smile. And that’s just going to have to be enough.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe I've written 3 chapters for this! I'm going back to school tomorrow so updates may come sporadically. I know the timeline and events may be a little bit off but like I said, I haven't watched this show since season 5 mid-season finale, like I really don't have a clue what's going on in the show anymore except from gifs, wikipedia, and the occasional youtube clip.


	4. I don't want to hear nobodies good reasons why I shouldn't fall in love this season, I will

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our heroine returns.

 

 

 

 

Time progresses differently now. Calendars aren’t followed directly and time becomes subjective. For Daryl it’s months of boredom punctuated by moments of terror, which then suddenly turn into years. 

So many people die, so much of his family that her words come back to haunt him periodically,  _ you’re gonna be the last man standing.  _ He hates her for that. 

He looked for Rick for months after the bridge. Searched for any sign, any clue, checked every walkers face after putting them down, but there was just nothing, he was gone. No trace left behind of the man he called his brother.

It gets to the point where he’d rather live out in the woods, back where he belongs, back where he was with her. They must have spent at least two months out in the woods before they had stumbled upon the funeral home, and he still misses her. Probably more than anybody else, he thinks of her the most, most days, most weeks, it’s the what-ifs that get to him.

Now he’s just an old man, living with a dog all alone. It’s not lonely except when it is. He still sees her face sometimes and he wonders if he’ll ever stop.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“We want you to come back,” Carol tells him. 

“For what?” 

“There’s someone that wants to see you!” Henry says, excited, with a shit eating grin on his face. 

Daryl squints his eyes at the boy, who the hell would want to see him. 

“What’s he talkin’ about?” 

Carol smiles, and her whole face lights up, “I think we should show you.” 

Daryl shakes his head, “Nah, I’m good.” 

She sighs, “Please, you’ll want to see her.” 

He can’t imagine who’s she’s talking about, Maggie was gone, Carol was with him, and Michonne knew how to get in contact with him. 

“I ain’t going,” he rasps, rubbing his hand through dog’s ears, he flicks the soft appendages and Dog makes a pleased sounding noise. 

Carol looks at Henry and the boy steps closer, she looks back at Daryl and he thinks they might just kidnap him if he doesn’t go by his own account. “It’s Beth,” she says. 

And then there’s a ringing in his ears, he feels himself stumble just a little, Carol grabbing his forearm, Henry placing a firm hand on his back. 

“What?” He manages to breathe out, feeling like someone gut punched him. 

Carol grins, nodding, and with tears in her eyes, “It’s true, she’s alive!”

Daryl starts shaking his head, he knows Carol would never lie about something like this, he knows she would never joke about it but something in his brain is not computing. It’s coming as a bigger shock than the first time he saw a walker. There’s just no way this is happening, maybe he’s having a stroke, or maybe he’s hallucinating again like he did when he went after Sophia.  _ Maybe,  _ he hit his head and he’s slowly bleeding out, alone, in the forest and this is all a figment of his imagination. 

But Carol grabs hold of his shoulders, her fingers digging into the hard flesh, “Daryl, did you hear me?” 

He thinks he nods because then Carol is telling Henry what to pack up and what he can leave behind, while Daryl just stands there like an idiot.  Carol gives him a little shake, “Well, are you coming, or not?” 

He clears his throat, can feel tears in his eyes, and isn’t this so fucking stupid? He’s just been told that the girl he’s been crying over for nearly a decade is back and all he can do is cry some more and stand doing nothing. But finally, finally he nods, “Let’s go.” 

He’s on autopilot the whole walk back to the Sanctuary, it takes a hundred years for them to open the gates and he ages a hundred more on the walk to Maggie’s house. 

Carol doesn’t bother knocking on the door, just pushes it open, and then Daryl stops breathing. She’s standing with her back to him, blonde hair loose and running all the way to her waist, she’s still thin, but she wears her body with ease, he can tell just by the way she’s standing. 

“He’s here!” Carol shouts, and Beth turns around and it’s like time has stopped. 

Her eyes are just as blue as he remembers, her skin is just as pale, her scars are inconsequential because all he can see is that same grin from when she was barely a woman. She walks to him in slow motion and Daryl always thought that was some stupid thing they used to do in the movies but it really feels that way. She doesn’t run and almost knock him over like he used to imagine she might have done if they had had time in the hospital, no, she must be at least twenty-five now, girl has lived a lifetime. 

She walks right up to him, the toes of her boots touching his, “Hey, stranger,” she says, with a smile and teasing lilt to her voice, she sounds the same and he’s so fucking happy in that moment. 

“Hi,” he murmurs back. 

Beth reaches a hand towards his face, her fingers slightly calloused as she wipes his face, he was crying and he hadn’t even noticed, Daryl brings his own hands up, cradles her face like he should have done so many years ago, “I missed you,” he tells her. 

She laughs, “I told you so.” 

And then Daryl wraps his arms around her, presses every inch of his body that he can to hers, squeezes her till she lets out a little sound but Beth holds on just as tight. She runs her hands up and down his arms, settling at the nape of his neck, she cards her fingers through the hair there and Daryl lets out a deep sigh. There’s so many things he wants to say, so many things he wants to know but for now he’ll settle for this. Beth in his arms is like a little taste of heaven, and it’s fine if that’s as close as he can ever get to the real thing. 

He takes a step back, just looking at her face, she’s  _ glowing _ , her cheeks redden under his scrutiny and he almost laughs. She’s hardly a teenager anymore and he’s pushing fifty and yet they’re still so young. 

“Come on, don’t keep her all to yourself!” Maggie laughs, playfully pulling on Beth’s hand, that startles Daryl, makes him realize they’re not the only ones in the room. But Beth just smiles and pulls him along to sit next to her with Maggie on the couch.  Carol sits nearby, the three of them listening as Beth recalls the last nine years. 

She tells them how she very obviously wasn’t dead when they left her in the trunk of a car just outside of Grady, she says how she had to stay for hours in the dark and heat before the herd had finished passing. Beth tells them she went back to the hospital, doesn’t remember exactly how she made it so far but the people there helped her, she figures it was guilt or maybe they had been good people once but corruption and greed had taken over for a while. 

“It took me a couple of months to remember anything, really,” she laughs, “I couldn’t even speak full sentences for the first year.” 

Maggie has started crying, holding onto Beth’s hands like a lifeline, with baby Hershel in her lap. “I wanted to look for you guys, I remembered Noah talking about Richmond but I was alone, there was no way I could have made it by myself.” 

And Daryl wants to tell her she’s wrong, she’s always been strong and she would have found a way to make it back to them, but even he knows that’s pushing it. He lost her track in a couple of hours when she was taken, how in the hell would she ever find them when they’d already been gone a little over a year? 

“We started taking people in, at Grady. At first it was just a couple of people passing by, but then word got around, that the hospital was as safe as could be, more people started arriving.” 

“Most of Atlanta has been cleared from walkers, there’s at least a thousand people living there now, it’s a very well built community from what I hear.” 

“You didn’t stay?” Carol asks. 

“No, I helped start that place but when I figured I could do the same other places, I left. A group of about forty of us headed to Texas, hill country, we started a community there too, we’ve built trading channels with people all the way to California,” Beth says, a proud smile on her face. 

“Wow, that’s great Bethy!” Maggie tells her, “meanwhile we’ve been living here on our own, thinking that we’re the only people left.” 

Beth shakes her head, “There’s still bad out there, herds bigger than anything you can imagine, but for the most part we’ve pushed them out to sea, it was one of the things we decided early on, in order to keep our communities safe we had to deal with the living  _ and _ the dead.” 

This woman is  _ amazing _ . There’s no other word for it. Daryl knows he’s never going to be good enough for her but goddamn, he wants to try. This woman has been out there  _ bringing life back _ , she’s been settling communities and he always knew how good she was but he never imagined something so biblical for lack of a better word. 

He can’t stop looking at her and she turns, a shy smile gracing her lips, she looks like she wants to burst out laughing, her face and neck red with embarrassment, “What?” She asks. 

He keeps staring because she’s there and alive and so beautiful, and she’s so smart and tough, and how can she still smile after losing so much. There’s no one on earth like Beth Greene, that’s the only thing Daryl knows. 

“What?” She asks again, a giggle in her voice, and he’s suddenly back in that funeral home, with her imitating him and asking him what changed his mind. 

He shakes his head, unable still after all these years to put every single thought into words, “Damn, girl, you’re somethin’ else, y’know that?” 

She shrugs, “Wasn’t that big of a deal.” 

  
  


* * *

 

  
  


Michonne, RJ, and Judith come to visit. The older woman cries as she holds Beth in her arms, and then she laughs when Beth can’t believe how Judith is so grown up, she introduces herself to RJ and the little boy hides behind his mother's legs, shy and embarrassed. 

“You’re just as pretty as your momma,” Beth tells the little girl, running her hand through the girls dark hair. 

“And you’re even prettier than Daryl said.” 

Michonne smirks and Beth blushes while Daryl tries to look at anywhere but her. He never actually  _ said  _ that to Judith, he might have compared Beth to a princess in one of his visits to the Sanctuary but that’s neither here nor their. Beth hugs the girl, says something in her ear that has Judith blinking back tears yet smiling wide at the same time. 

They have supper and Beth recounts her journey yet again. And Daryl can see the moment she becomes Judith’s own version of a superhero, the girl looks in awe as Beth talks about the things she’s built and accomplished, and Daryl doesn’t blame her. 

They all end up staying in the same house, like old times. Beth in the bedroom with Maggie, Michonne, Judith and RJ in another one, and Carol and himself stay downstairs in the living room, Carol laying on couches with Daryl laying on the floor, in front of the fireplace. The house is silent, with the odd noise here and there coming from the outside, people walking to keep watch, owls hooting loudly, then he hears the stairs creaking, wondering if it’s Judith, but then the steps pause and he turns over, Beth standing at the foot of the stairs. Hair mussed and only wearing a large men’s t-shirt and a pair of fuzzy socks. 

He knows she can’t see his face because the light from the fireplace is hitting his back but it doesn’t stop her from trying, she squints her eyes as she walks towards him. 

“Daryl?” She whispers. 

He shifts and Beth pauses, “You awake?” 

“Yeah,” he grunts, sitting up so he can see her better. He gets to his feet and signals for her to follow him. They walk into the kitchen and sit at the kitchen table, the light from outside the only source of brightness in the room. He waits for Beth to start talking, he knows she probably has a lot to say to him, she wouldn’t have gotten up in the middle of the night, if she didn’t. He looks at his hands, clears his throat and freezes when her hand goes to his face. Beth pushes his hair back, tugging on the dark strands, “I never stopped thinking about you,” she says. 

“I used to—,” she shakes her head, smiling like she’s embarrassed, then she takes a deep breath, “I used to tell people I had a husband,” she grins then, her cheeks pink, “remember? Like we used to back then?” 

He nods, his throat closing up, and he doesn’t understand why his eyes are getting watery. 

“I used to think about you all the time,” Beth sighs, “probably the most out of everyone, even Maggie.” 

Daryl bites at his inner lip, silent, because what the fuck can he say to her to make any of this better? She was a teenager with the whole world ahead of her when everything went to shit, she was shot in the head and left for dead, roamed around for almost ten years, he knows better than anyone that sometimes words don’t mean anything. 

“I used to think ‘what would Daryl do?’” She smiles at him, “out there, you were  _ always  _ with me.” 

He looks at her and it feels like she can see inside him, into the parts he’s ashamed of, every secret, every lie he’s ever told, all of it out in the open. And yet, it doesn’t matter, because Daryl can see inside her too. 

“You still sing?” He asks, voice scratchy with age and hard living. 

“I never stopped.” 

  
  


* * *

 

  
  


Beth gets introduced to everyone in the community and they all like her, how could they not. 

“So, that’s her?” Aaron asks, as they sit on the front steps of Maggie’s house, watching Beth speak with a couple of other women. 

“That’s Beth,” he responds. 

“No,” Aaron grins, “That’s  _ her. _ ”

Daryl squints his eyes, “What?” 

“That’s the woman that changed your life.”

He grunts, unsure of what to say because yeah she had but he doesn’t go around announcing it or anything. 

Aaron lets out a quiet laugh, “We all have that one person, that person that changes your life whether you want them to or not.” 

“I’m glad you got her back,” Aaron says, a little sad, probably thinking of Eric, but smiling all the same. 

“Also, now I know why you were so grumpy without her, she’s a real looker,” the other man grins, no shame on his face whatsoever. 

Daryl snorts, “Joke’s on you, ‘m always a grump.” 

  
  


* * *

 

  
  


“That’s not fair,” she pouts.

“What is?”

“That, you’re still so handsome,” Beth breathes out. 

He’s almost fifty and he can’t believe how compliments still make him uncomfortable, he feels his neck getting hot, they were sitting in her house now, a small thing with only one bedroom, Maggie had insisted on giving Beth her own place. She didn’t want a spot of her own, and Daryl feared it was because she wasn’t planning on staying, that maybe she wanted to go back out there and keep building communities. But that wasn’t it at all, Beth said that it would be a waste of space, she could easily stay with Maggie, the house could go to someone else. 

The Greene sisters were a stubborn lot though, Maggie had insisted, “What if you want company over some time?” 

“We have the same friends!” Beth said. 

Maggie had grinned, “Not  _ that  _ kind of company.” 

And Beth had blushed so hard her skin had looked like it was sunburnt, it was probably a lot to do with the fact that Daryl had been standing  **right there** , looking at anything but either of the women. 

So days later she had invited Daryl and Dog over, and so there he was, sitting next to her on a floral loveseat, they’d been talking for hours, pausing only for a snack break or to actually eat a meal. Dog had been let in and out of the house, and they had stood outside as a bunch of kids from the compound had stopped by to pet him. But now they were back inside, and they had been staring at each other for the past ten minutes, Beth giggling every time they made eye contact. He used to like watching her back before she got taken, he used to like the delicate way she did everything, even when she’d been killing walkers, there was always a grace to her. He never knew she liked watching him just as much. 

“I always knew I’d see you again,” she says, “that was the one thing I never lost faith in.” 

He swallows hard, unable to express what those words mean to him. She’d been the one good thing in his whole life and then to be robbed of that was devastating in a way he’d never know he could be, and to know that she was out there somewhere,  _ thinking about him _ . It almost made him want to cry. 

“Daryl, can I ask you something?” She pauses, her expression turning serious, “I’ve been here for almost a week and I haven’t even asked you, and believe me, I feel terrible about it—-“

He interrupts her because he can tell she’s getting nervous, and he has no idea what could be causing that, “G’head and ask me what you want, Greene.” 

She takes a deep breath, “Well, it’s just that I was gone for  _ nine years _ , did you— did you ever lose someone?” She asks. And Daryl frowns, because he thought they’d gone over this the first day she was here. She knows who was lost in that time. 

“Thought we already went through that,” he says, quietly. Maybe it was a side effect of the bullet to the head, he doesn’t want to start making her feel bad about that though. 

“No!” She responds, and the tone makes him lean away from her just a little, “No,” she says again, calmer and softer. “I mean, was there anyone special in all this time? Like—like someone you loved?” 

And there it is. 

He feels like the air has been punched out of his chest, because how could she not know? He would have gladly given his life for her a hundred times over in the time they were together, even before that, it was all the little things that added up to the bigger ones later on. But she doesn’t know, and how could she when they never had time. Beth wasn’t around to see him in pain, to watch him mourn, she  _ really has no idea _ . 

Daryl shakes his head, looks her in the light of a few candles scattered across the room, and maybe her face is older and the scars on it are new to him, but he feels the exact same way he did back in that funeral home. With her blue eyes scorching holes into his soul, and her accepting demeanor that made him feel like a kid, he hopes he can tell her what he can’t say in words with his eyes, he thinks she might have gotten close back then but he’ll do it again and again if he has to. 

“It’s always been you,” he tells her, no tremor in his voice, just the plain truth. 

Her mouth falls slightly open, her eyes get glassy but she keeps looking at him, their entire world is right then and there, in that small one bedroom shack with the floral loveseat and Dog laying at their feet. 

“Oh,” she says. 

  
  
  
  


 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't want their reunion to be so cheesy/emotional because I think a.) daryl's had enough of the emotions and b.) they haven't seen each other in YEARS, of course they're happy, and of course daryl can't stop screaming in his own head but time and distance plays a part in how they react to each other. also the fact that daryl never actually said how he felt about her, like ever. AND YES I HAD TO END IT WITH THAT OH, that single little word ruined me for bethyl FOREVER.


End file.
